The present invention relates to a physical training apparatus, suitable in particular for strengthening the shoulder rotators and a work load handling device that can be adapted to exercise machines of different kinds. In particular, the invention relates to a physical training apparatus suitable for both rehabilitation and recreational purposes.
Physical exercise machines for training or rehabilitating the body or the body parts are being used more and more both in sports and in physical therapy. Indeed their use for therapeutic purposes in addition to purely recreational purposes is now widely accepted.
The vast range of conventional exercise machines currently available are designed for training different parts of the body with an adjustable load, usually consisting of plates made of cast iron or similar material, which can be stacked on one another and whose magnitude can be selected by the user in such a way as to create a desired work load.
The plates are connected to a chain or cable which is in turn connected to an element, such as a bar, handle, or similar handgrip designed to enable the user to lift and lower the plates in a vertical direction.
The system for creating the work load just described is the one most commonly used but, alternatively, it can be substituted by elastic belts of appropriate resistance designed to offer resistance to the moving of a mechanical part of the exercise machine, thereby applying a work load on the muscles of the user performing the movement.
Both techniques just described used to create the work load have certain disadvantages. For example, that the resistance offered by the load (plates or elastic belts) is applied during the positive component of a given movement when the user lifts the load, by muscular contraction or tension to exert physical force and hence exercise the muscles directly concerned.
However, during the negative component of the movement, when muscular contraction is relaxed and the load returns to its initial position by gravity, muscular work is reduced to accompanying the downward movement of the load, with the muscles extended instead of contracted.
In these machines, the gravitational nature of the load provided by the plates made of cast iron or similar material, forces the user to perform exercises in which the muscular effort applied to the user interface part is eccentric during the first part of the going stroke, (in the sense that its direction is opposite to that of the action of the load), and remains such until the end of the going stroke. On the other hand the muscular effort is concentric during the entire return stroke, that is, its direction is the same as that of the load. The working characteristic just described greatly reduces the utility of these machines for users that are patients whose joints only permit very limited angular movements and must be restored to their normal condition. In these cases, the load should cause eccentric and concentric effort alternately during the same stroke (going and/or return stroke) of the user interface part. Since gravity-loaded exercise machines capable of causing an effort of this kind are unavailable, patients frequently require the services of a physical therapist. Therefore, the success of the rehabilitation treatment is closely connected with the skill of the physical therapist.
In addition, if the patient to be rehabilitated is very heavily-built, the muscular strength required of the physical therapist may be more than the physical therapist's strength and this is obviously not acceptable in principle. Therefore, the exercise is effective mainly in the first part of the movement since the return movement requires less effort.
The present invention relates in particular to an apparatus for training the shoulder rotators, which are often injured in accidents.
Of the exercise machines of the kind described above, there is none that is especially designed for training the rotators and that is capable of guaranteeing a muscular effort that the user can adjust through the entire arc of the movement, nor can machines for strengthening the shoulder muscles in general (deltoids and similar muscles) be easily adapted to create loads that permit exercising of the rotators.
An aim of the present invention is to permit a user with a joint to be rehabilitated to recover its proper functioning by the use of an apparatus that is intrinsically safe--because it is based on simple mechanical principles and, therefore, based on a gravity type load--but that offers the user (whether to be rehabilitated or not) the possibility of exercising the muscles by alternating concentric and eccentric effort during a single stroke of the user interface that interacts with the load.
The present invention therefore has for its main object to provide an apparatus for training the shoulder rotators both for therapeutic and sports purposes.
In the context of this object, an aim of the present invention is to provide an apparatus for training the shoulder rotators that enables these muscles to work effectively through the entire arc of the movement performed.
Another aim of the present invention is to provide an apparatus for training the shoulder rotators that is suitable for users of different builds.
Another aim of the present invention is to provide an apparatus for training the shoulder rotators where the load can be adjusted at will according to requirements. Another aim of the present invention is to provide an apparatus for training the shoulder rotators that makes it possible to select the extent of the movement.
A further aim of the present invention is to provide a device for handling a load that can exert on the muscles that perform the movement an effort which the user can control through the entire arc of the movement and that can be adapted for exercise machines suitable for training any part of the body.
Yet another aim of the present invention is to provide a training apparatus that is highly reliable, relatively simple in construction and can be made at a competitive cost.